Sunday 19 February 2012

I've Been Watching...

Since Terror of the Autons isn't on DVD yet, I went for The Time Monster (so you might be able to guess what else I'm about to watch).

While I remembered the Master, TOMTIT, Atlantis and Kronos, I didn't remember that it was six parts instead of four. And it easily could have been a four-parter, two in the present, two in the past. While this could lead to a lot of padding, we do get a lot of character moments, and any character moments with Roger Delago's Master are moments to treasure, and him vs the Doctor and Jo makes for great tv. ...however, there is still a lot of padding, episode one for example, episode three, episode five... yeah, it could have been snappier.

I don't know if this is due to running out of steam, but the commentaries weren't great. John Levene's episodes are not making me want to go see him at Armageddon. And they just rope in some new series writers to do an episode. What's up with that? I remember how on Red Dwarf they got some fan competition winners to commentate, and that was a bonus track!

And the other thing on the disc is a behind the scenes talk, including a scientist saying 'this is possible, this just isn't'. We know it's not that possible, this is science fiction. Were they trying something different again? Some times that works, this time not really.

A lot happens in this, but also a lot of nothing. There are quite a few scenes where the characters admit they are just waiting for the next thing to happen, and that's not a good sign. Like them, then, skip to the good bits.

[END]

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